Wednesday, 30 June 2010

Labour push ahead

The election of a Conservative- Liberal Democrat government in Westminster has created a bounce. But the bounce is for Labour in Wales at least according to the ITV Wales YouGov tracking poll.

42 per cent of those polled have indicated that if there was an Assembly election held now they would vote Labour in Constituency vote. This is an increase of 10% from May. This same level of increase was also reflected in which party they would vote for in the regional list vote – 40 per cent.

This beats Labour’s best-ever vote in an Assembly election, which was 40% constituency and 37% regional in 2003, when they won 30 of the 60 seats.

The big losers are the Liberal Democrats with a fall of 8 per cent from their May ratings. At that time 20 per cent would vote for them in the constituency vote and 18 per cent in the regional lists. This latest poll shows a drop to 12 per cent in both constituency and regional lists.

Plaid Cymru and the Conservatives are running neck and neck with one another. With those polled indicating that 20 per cent would vote for Plaid Cymru in the constituency section and 19 per cent on the regional list. And those indicated that their preference for the Conservatives would be on the basis of 19 per cent in the constituency and 20 per cent on the regional list.

On the basis of this poll Labour could for the first time edge towards a majority in the Assembly.

The same poll indicates an increase in the number of those likely to vote ‘Yes’ in favour of more law making powers for the Assembly. Now 55% are in favour; 28% against and 17% either don’t know how they’d vote or won’t vote at all on the issue. This is 6 per cent up on ITV Wales’s April poll.

Gareth, The full data for the poll has just been published on the YouGov website, and part of the data is that the Yes/No percentages are broken down according to Westminster voting intention.

I just emailed YouGov to ask if they could give me the breakdown according to Assembly voting intention. They said that it was a matter for the end client, i.e. ITV Wales.

So I'm asking if you might be able to have a word in the right ears at ITV Wales to get that breakdown. The data is all there from the fieldwork, but extracting it requires someone to press a few buttons.